“Vyapam” Scam: Reflection on Politicians and Bureaucrats

“Vyapam” Scam: Reflection on Politicians and Bureaucrats

In “Vyapam” scam of Madhya Pradesh, which had been going on since the 1990s, over 2000 persons, including the state’s education minister, have been arrested. Over 40 persons, involved with the investigation, have died in mysterious circumstances. “Vyapam” scam is a sad reflection on politicians and bureaucrats in India. What this scam shows and what we as citizens can do are discussed below.

Unfair Selection Process

This is one scam which has come to light. Similar practices of unfair selection are likely to be in vogue elsewhere in the country as well.

Massive Efforts to Cover Up

The large number of deaths clearly suggests elimination of key persons who were suspected of providing incriminating evidence against the rich and powerful. It also shows the descent of ethical values to the extent that taking of lives to save the rich and powerful from conviction is considered acceptable.

Institutional Promotion of Corruption

That politicians and bureaucrats in India are massively corrupt is well known. This case proves the point further. The corrupt system which selects undeserving candidates, leads to their continuing with corrupt practices to ‘recover the bribes given with interest’ over their careers. It in fact legitimizes such actions in the eyes of the society.

Promotion of Incompetence

Indian leadership, by such acts, is promoting incompetence in Indian society, thus resulting in poor performance of the nation and lowering incentive to attain competence by simple hard work.

Failure of Investigating and Judicial Mechanism to Pose a Deterrent

People indulge in such acts when the deterrence is negligible. This is the state in our country today. It is well known that chances of conviction are remote. The rich and powerful believe that they can subvert the investigating and judicial mechanism. Our historical record in such cases supports their belief. The largesse of people like Lalit Modi has been enjoyed by politicians of all parties. His ill gotten wealth could apparently buy him valuable support, just like the people involved in this scam.

What should an Honest Citizen do?

In the above case the bribe givers were common men. They were seeking subversion of the system from the obliging government mechanism.

Honest citizens can choose the harder way of enhancing their competence to get selected, rather than attempting to manipulate the system.

They can exercise their energies to bring cases of wrong doings to light through media, opposition parties, etc.

The measures are difficult to follow for a society, which itself is similar to the leadership! Life is really tough for a simple honest citizen in India today. Well, probably it always has been so!

Colonel M.M Nehru

Col. MM Nehru, Director at NFA, is a Personality Developer. He is an experienced trainer and has orchestrated numerous sessions around leadership, time management and personal effectiveness for corporate clientele. He holds a master’s degree (PGDM) in Defence Studies and Business Administration and was an Arts Graduate. If you want to know more about Colonel Nehru Click Here

1 Comment

Nethaji G · Jul 19, 2015 at 4:37 am

Respected Sir, As you said life for a common and honest Indian is very difficult here. Only thing we have to do to stop these kind of scam is to be honest and work hard in smart way to reach the success instead of going to some other agencies for govt job. Every youth of this country have to practice this straight forward action to stop such a scam.